Why the FBI raided Mar-a-Lago
Post Reports
The Washington Post
4.4 • 5.1K Ratings
🗓️ 9 August 2022
⏱️ 22 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Today on Post Reports, why the FBI searched former president Donald Trump’s Florida residence, Mar-a-Lago, and what they’re looking for.
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On Monday, former president Donald Trump announced that his Palm Beach, Fla., home had been searched by the FBI. No former president has ever faced a search by federal investigators like this.
This is the next step in an investigation of whether Trump took classified documents with him when he left the White House. The National Archives retrieved 15 boxes of documents from Mar-a-Lago earlier this year.
Matt Zapotosky, an editor at The Post who formerly covered the Justice Department, explains what federal agents were looking for and the complex calculations behind the FBI’s search.
Transcript
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| 0:17.0 | It seems like this is a moment where a lot of people are investigating the actions of former |
| 0:22.4 | President Donald Trump. |
| 0:23.6 | There's the Congressional Investigation into January 6th. |
| 0:30.3 | There's the Justice Department investigation into overturning the 2020 election. |
| 0:35.4 | And then there's this other investigation that's culminated this week at Mar-a-Lago. |
| 0:41.1 | So Monday night, FBI agents showed up at Trump's resort down in Florida, his home, |
| 0:47.6 | and they went searching for floor documents. |
| 0:51.3 | That's Mansa Pataski. Up until recently, he was a reporter covering the Justice Department. |
| 0:57.6 | Now he's an editor at the post. |
| 0:59.1 | It was really this sort of spectacular moment. |
| 1:02.1 | You know, everybody for a long time has been really interested, and in some cases, |
| 1:07.0 | pressuring the Justice Department to do more to investigate former President Trump. |
| 1:11.6 | And then you have this, you know, really dramatic. |
| 1:14.6 | And I guess I would say unprecedented scene of the FBI going down and searching the home of the |
| 1:20.1 | former President. |
| 1:24.5 | From the newsroom of the Washington Post, this is Post Reports. |
| 1:28.0 | I'm Martine Powers. It's Tuesday, August 9th. |
| 1:31.9 | Today, we pull back the curtain on the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago. |
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